Are you going?

Have you ever been?

What did you think of it?

I live on the isle of wight 🙂

Never been, wish i had sometimes, i still think its awesome and the tv coverage proves that, and last year i heard it all from my house at night 🙂

means my local area is deserted so better biking quality 🙂

I went a couple of years ago when Stereophonics were headlining.

It was a fantastic weekend and as “intense” as you wanted. Go mental down the front, chill out in a deckchair at the back or find your own place in the middle.

We’re going again this year, the mix isn’t exactly my cup of tea but should be a fantastic show. Highly recommended!

I’m going…first ever festival – very excited! Are airbeds a good idea?!

Depends how particular you are about the surface you sleep on! I didn’t spend a huge amount of time in my bed to be honest 😆

I went to bestival last year, was great! I bought a single airbed, was good, might be useful as a flotation aid if the mud gets bad,,,

I’ve been going for tha past four years. It was awesome to start with but it’s gettjg very chavvy to the point where every day you would speak to people who had stuff pinched or their tent trashed. Not had this personally but last year my friend had her four person tent trashed completely which would have taken some effort. Also some bloke nailed a girl in nearby tent only for us to find out later it wasn’t his tent and he stole the persons duvet and left a used jonny in it’s place! Lovely

That said I’ve not had any issues myself other than the fact that I can’t drink anymore and the music is to loud and I need to sleep at 10pm!! I love it there, it’s a small festival but that’s what makes it so intimate and generally you meet a lot of good people there. I tend to go in a group of about 20-30 people so that also makes it an awesome time. Last year the music was ace and as a bonus Wight link forgot to put the ferry prices up whentickets first went on sale so I got a return for 55 instead of 110 and that’s from Pompey. If you’ve not been then defy lately have a go. This year is the 10year anniversary and te line up is awesome.

I would suggest though that you go there for the Thursday if you can as early as possible. That was you can pitch up in teenage wasteland which is nice and close and a dent walking distance from both the cars and the fields.

I went six (or so) years ago – The Who were on (and abso-****-lutely awesome they were too). It was a really good experience.

We’d only ever been to Glasto before that and the IOW was just a bit more chilled/less extreme/nice*. We had a great time.

The biggest advantage is that you can, if you want, just step outside the festival and go do something completely ‘normal’ if you want. We’d had enough one night, so had a wander and found a nice little restaurant.

*delete as appropriate.

huge corporate middle class **** fest for really dull people keen to demonstrate how “interesting” they are. The line up mostly consists of really dull stadium wannabe bands. that’s just my opinion of course, I won’t be playing there again unless I get enough hard cash to make a statue of myself.:)

never been to IoW festival, but the IoW itself is lovely.
i am going to Sonisphere festival at Knebworth this year though. can’t wait
is anyone else going?

Bestival is waaaaaaaaay better. I’m from the Isle of Wight, have done both several times, IOW Fest just can’t compare to Besty. Far too many people crammed into a small site that funnels down to the main stage so no escape to the sides. Seen some really good acts there and of course had a great time but as has been said, it is a bit chavvy and can be stressful.

I’ll bet schroedingerscat wishes it was all like the original Stonehenge Free Festival. Maaaaan.

No not at all, it’s just really geared to getting as much cash as possible off everybody there by any means, which means it ends up being quite soulless, the organisers try to get as many types of music on the bill as they can to pull the max punters in and end up with a horrible mish mash of styles and no real atmosphere.

Most of they musicians, myself included, that have played there do so for the money(which tbf isn’t bad) and get the hell out and back to the mainland as soon as they can.

Plenty of other festivals, the bands will pretty much just play for the sheer hell of it and hang around once they’ve played.

Fair point, well taken. Pretty much like most of the major festivals I guess. Only ever been to Reading, and the last time was around ’95. Incredibly dusty, that year, saw a lot of bands, but it lacked soul, for want of a better word. I did actually go to one of the original Stonehenge Free Festivals. Pretty dull, unless you were totally off yer head, which I wasn’t. Nobody playing that was in any way memorable. The Bristol Ashton Court Festival was way better, free, saw Longpigs there, and Portishead, among many. Excellent atmosphere, too.

Only a couple of days to go now! 😆